![\"Steve-Earle-Issue-No27\"](\"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/Steve-Earle-Issue-No27.jpg\")
STEVE EARLE<\/h1>\nSTEVE EARLE<\/h1>\nA powerful storyteller takes a hard look at hard times \u00a0<\/b>\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n
\u201cAll singer-songwriters do this job on groundwork laid by Bob Dylan, who built his own fame based on Woody Guthrie,\u201d says Steve Earle. \u201cWe\u2019ve all done it with one foot in the 1930s, even though none of us\u2014including Bob\u2014witnessed that time firsthand. Times are really hard these days. What I\u2019m seeing out the window is a lot closer to what Woody saw than it\u2019s been in a long time, though I\u2019m seeing it from a half-million-dollar tour bus rather than a boxcar.\u201d<\/p>\n
The view from that bus window served as inspiration for Earle\u2019s 15th studio album, The Low Highway<\/i>, a collection co-produced with Ray Kennedy that includes unflinching depictions of economic hardship, homelessness (\u201cInvisible\u201d) and the meth epidemic in rural America (\u201cCalico County\u201d), alongside songs written for HBO\u2019s New Orleans\u2013based drama Treme<\/i>, on which Earle played a street musician.<\/p>\n
In addition to being an actor and musician, Earle is also an accomplished prose writer, with multiple publications to his credit and more in the works. \u201cI write every day, though not necessarily songs,\u201d he says. \u201cI write about stuff I feel needs to be written. I write mainly because it\u2019s my job. I write because I believe it\u2019s what I was put here to do, and I believe it\u2019s disrespectful to the cosmos not to do what you were put here to do. A lot of people have a hard time figuring out what they\u2019re here for. I don\u2019t. I know why I\u2019m here.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
How many songs did you start with?<\/b><\/p>\n
I had 10 of the 12 songs written, and wrote two in the process of recording. Several songs were written for Treme<\/i>, since that\u2019s what occupied a lot of my time when I was writing for this record. I wrote two songs with Lucia Micarelli, who plays Annie on Treme<\/i>. \u201cAfter Mardi Gras\u201d was a case of life imitating art and art imitating life. There was a storyline on the show where Harley, my character, is trying to convince her that she needs to learn how to write, because that will set her character apart from the other street performers in New Orleans and help her land a record deal. Lucia came up with a chord progression and the bare bones of a melody. I took that and wrote the melody and chorus. In the second season, you see Lucia sing it for the first time on the street. I wrote most of \u201cLove\u2019s Gonna Blow My Way,\u201d but Lucia wrote the instrumental section in the middle that doesn\u2019t have anything to do with the chord progression, which is sort of a classical thing to do.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
What does Ray bring to this project?<\/b><\/p>\n
Before The Low Highway<\/i>, Ray and I hadn\u2019t co-produced a record since The Revolution Starts Now<\/i>, but we\u2019ve done other projects together, and he mixed Townes<\/i>. Ray\u2019s especially good at what he does. When we work on my stuff, basically he\u2019s the engineer and I\u2019m the producer\/arranger. He carries a lot of the water on the technical end.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
What was the recording process like?<\/b><\/p>\n
I wanted to make a record with my touring band the Dukes because they\u2019re the best band I\u2019ve ever had. We recorded in Nashville for five days and did nearly all of it live. The only overdubs are the organ part on\u00a0\u201cPocket Full of Rain\u201d\u2014Allison [Moorer, Earle\u2019s wife] left that day because our son John Henry wasn\u2019t feeling well\u2014and the backing vocals on \u201cAfter Mardi Gras.\u201d Everything else was recorded live. Ray started mixing the record after five days. I\u2019m rarely present for mixing anymore\u2014I trust Ray. Before mixing, we sit down, listen to everything, and I get my notes in. Then he mixes, and we can communicate on the internet. A lot of this record was mixed while I was on vacation in Florida. All the songs were pretty easy to record, we never struggled in the studio\u2014though I struggled writing \u201cInvisible.\u201d I started it for I\u2019ll Never Get Out of This World Alive<\/i> but never could get it to hold together. I guess it just needed to be part of this group of songs. Thematically, \u201cInvisible\u201d has more to do with this record than the last, which was an inward-looking record. This is\u00a0more outward-looking.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Seems \u201cCalico County\u201d is a jab at the redneck glorification in country?<\/b><\/p>\n
Absolutely. Some people blame that redneck trend on me. All the people who heard \u201cCopperhead Road\u201d and didn\u2019t get it blame that on me. It\u2019s OK to be country, to be a redneck, but you can wallow in it to a point where it\u2019ll hold you back. I\u2019m trying to evolve. I don\u2019t watch reality television. I don\u2019t even watch Will Ferrell movies. I\u2019m\u00a0trying to become smarter.<\/p>\n
\u201cRemember Me\u201d is a personal song.<\/b><\/p>\n
It\u2019s about me being old. I\u2019m 58 and my son is 3\u2014if I take really good care of myself and I\u2019m lucky, I might see him through high school. That\u2019s just the math. I felt the need to leave something behind, just in case.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
How have you evolved in the 27 years since your debut, Guitar Town<\/i>?<\/b><\/p>\n
I\u2019m still trying to say the same things now that I was then. I think I\u2019m way better at it now. I\u2019m a better singer, and that was mostly emphysema. I don\u2019t have any records that I\u2019m ashamed of, but I have a little trouble listening to my voice on the older stuff. This idea that the political records I made over the past few years are something new isn\u2019t true. Copperhead Road<\/i> was a political record. I was raised in the \u201960s and \u201970s and never thought there was any reason to separate art and politics. What I\u2019m doing isn\u2019t first and foremost pop music, it\u2019s first and foremost art. The intention is to make art, and that goes hand in hand with politics.<\/p>\n
I think the audience I have understands that connection between art and politics. There are some who thought they were seeing something else in me and were mistaken. Even critics thought I was some kind of neo-traditionalist country artist. They were disappointed I wasn\u2019t, but I never told them I was. I used the word hillbilly and pissed off George Jones, God rest his soul. He said, \u201cWe spent all these years trying to keep from being called hillbillies, and\u00a0Dwight Yoakam and Steve Earle screwed that up in 15 minutes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Guitar Town<\/i> being a No. 1 country album still blows my mind. I\u2019m very grateful for it since it was the beginning of my career, but I saw immediately that I was going to have to cultivate a different audience, because country radio wasn\u2019t going to continue to support what I did. The single performance on Guitar Town<\/i> was very spotty, and I saw that I was going to have to do something else. I was lucky I had a publishing deal. I made $85,000 a year just from publishing, so I could live on that and use the money I got from performances to pay the band, keep a cheap bus, and\u00a0stay out on the road.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Any goals you want to achieve?<\/b><\/p>\n
I\u2019ve thought about writing a musical. I\u2019m working on a memoir now that will probably come out early next year, and a novel that will come out about a year after that. I\u2019ve got to finish a couple of other projects I\u2019ve got on the front burners before I think\u00a0about anything new.<\/p>\n
\u2013Juli Thanki<\/p>\n
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STEVE EARLE A powerful storyteller takes a hard look at hard times \u00a0\u00a0 \u201cAll singer-songwriters do this job on groundwork laid by Bob Dylan, who built his own fame based on Woody Guthrie,\u201d says Steve Earle. \u201cWe\u2019ve all done it with one foot in the 1930s, even though none of us\u2014including Bob\u2014witnessed that time firsthand. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7],"tags":[3592,6918,6875,6917,2417,6527,6916],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10310"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10310"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10310\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10313,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10310\/revisions\/10313"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}